Wine Country (2019)

Wine Country shows that women in their 50s are in one of the best phases of their lives, a time to be celebrated, welcomed, and enjoyed with good friends and good wine.

Wine Country is scrappy and, at times, misjudged but it’s also very, very funny with a cast of women whose collective charm makes the patchier moments forgivable. Watching it with wine helps too.

Judging by her funny, warm, drawn-from-life feature directing debut Wine Country, Amy Poehler is a gracious friend. She and screenwriters Emily Spivey and Liz Cackowski ensure that the many former “Saturday Night Live” performers and writers assembled for this Napa Valley-set Netflix comedy get moments to shine.

Poehler's adept at showcasing not just the comic gifts of her cast, whose decades-long friendships began in improv theaters and at SNL, but also the joyful vamping that connects their characters.

The friends we see on-screen are equally close in real life, and the outing depicted in Wine Country was inspired by similar trips they’ve made together. That explains the second-nature chemistry that makes them so much fun to watch, even when the shenanigans...leave one longing for the outrageousness of an all-female studio comedy like “Bridesmaids” or “Girls Trip.”